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Bloomberg

Days before a deadline in talks between Iran and world powers, diplomats escalated their efforts to break an impasse and end an 11-year dispute over the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program.

While negotiators said they remained focused on meeting their self-imposed Nov. 24 deadline, four Western diplomats said yesterday that an extension to the talks may be needed to come to a binding agreement limiting Iran’s nuclear work in exchange for relief from economic sanctions. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius and U.K. Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond will join talks in the Austrian capital today.

Iran has signaled that it’s ready to allow intrusive inspections of its nuclear facilities after Nov. 24 even if a comprehensive accord isn’t reached, three of the officials said. All asked not to be named because the talks are private.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will continue meetings with European Union envoy Catherine Ashton and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif before breaking to consult with his French and U.K. allies. Germany’s Foreign Minister Frank- Walter Steinmeier will also travel to Vienna. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi haven’t indicated whether they’ll attend.

Broad access for International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors will be an essential part of any permanent deal, according to the diplomats. IAEA monitors were granted wider and more frequent visits to factories where nuclear equipment is made, as well as uranium mines, under last year’s accord.

Iranian Leverage

Volunteering to continue giving inspectors such access may give Iran leverage to win some concessions if the talks are extended beyond the deadline. Hardliners in Iran have threatened to reduce access to the bare minimum if no deal is reached.

The two sides have made a great deal of progress, according to a senior Iranian diplomat cited by the Islamic Student News Agency. The final agreement may contain a four- or five-page introduction followed by 30 to 40 pages of details outlining the accord, said the diplomat, who wasn’t identified.

Western and Russian diplomats are less optimistic. One European diplomat familiar with the talks said a final agreement by next week was unlikely because the Iranians hadn’t compromised enough and time was running out to draft the technical language for a deal.

The two biggest issues separating the sides remain the number and type of centrifuges Iran would be permitted to operate and the pace of sanctions relief, the diplomats said.

‘Final Hour’

Kerry said an extension of the talks wasn’t being discussed at present. If we “get to the final hour and in need of having to look at alternatives or something, we’ll look at them,” he said. The secretary of state’s “date of departure from Vienna is not yet determined,” his spokeswoman, Jen Psaki, said in a statement from Paris.

The consequences that both sides would face without an accord will be “staggering,” the National Iranian-American Council said in a report this week. “Rejecting a good deal because it is not perfect” would “only lead to an even more imperfect situation under no deal,” it said.

Underscoring the divide in the U.S. between those seeking a deal with Iran and others who say the country can’t be trusted, two lawmakers warned instead of the consequences of a flawed agreement.

Iran ‘Stonewalling’

“We are greatly concerned by reports that Iran is seeking to keep -- and not dismantle -- much of its nuclear infrastructure,” Representative Ed Royce, the Republican chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Representative Eliot Engel, its top Democrat, said yesterday in a statement. “Concerning also is Iran’s continued stonewalling of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the key verification agency, about its past bomb work.”

The country hasn’t always allowed IAEA inspectors free access to restricted areas. A central dispute is whether investigators will be allowed to return to Iran’s sprawling Parchin military complex, which they visited in 2005. Iran, which says its nuclear program is solely for civilian purposes, so far has refused to allow such a visit.